


a watched pot

by Darkfromday



Series: The Last Kings of Lucis [4]
Category: Final Fantasy XV
Genre: Cor lost to Gilagamesh and is very wounded, F/M, Gen, King Mors is allergic to feelings, Regis is not handling his stress well, at least Ardyn's having a good time
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-05-23
Updated: 2019-05-23
Packaged: 2020-01-31 20:42:56
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,313
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18599053
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Darkfromday/pseuds/Darkfromday
Summary: 19-year-old Regis holds vigil for his youngest comrade-in-arms.





	a watched pot

**Author's Note:**

  * Inspired by [How to Make iOS Text Messages on AO3](https://archiveofourown.org/works/6434845) by [CodenameCarrot](https://archiveofourown.org/users/CodenameCarrot/pseuds/CodenameCarrot), [La_Temperanza](https://archiveofourown.org/users/La_Temperanza/pseuds/La_Temperanza). 



> Warning for relatively detailed descriptions of injuries sustained in battle and wartime.
> 
> (I lost the fistfight. My punishment, handed down from SE themselves, was to give a woman a limited role in my next XV fic. Gah.)

The night is too quiet.

Insomnia can normally be counted upon to fill in any silence from the Citadel. In happier times, it easily would. But the double blow of losing Accordo's possible support against Niflheim and losing ground in Duscae, Cleigne and Leide has subdued the generally-boisterous populace. Though the lights still burn brightly in the skyscrapers and from the streetlamps, the tireless citizens have succumbed to sleep.

 _Not so for their prince_ , thinks Regis.

He stands on a balcony high above the palace courtyard, staring out at the dark canyon in the distance which probably isn't Taelpar Crag but will receive the full force of his helpless anger anyway. On top of the war taking away his people's peace of mind, that blasted canyon has nearly robbed him of a treasured comrade—someone he might even call 'friend' one day.

Now it is uncertain if he will live to see that day.

Behind him, Cor Leonis tosses fitfully in the crown prince's enormous four-poster bed. Or tries to—his limbs have been secured for his own safety, to prevent him re-opening his own wounds, so there's only so much moving he can manage. It is painful to look at him, so Regis doesn't... for a little longer.

Not looking doesn't keep him from hearing his friend's hisses of pain. It doesn't prevent him knowing he is helpless to do anything  _but_ watch.

 _Damn it, damn it, damn it_.

The sheets will need to be laundered come morning, regardless of whether Cor lives or...

Regis bites through his lip, to stop a shout.

His phone buzzes, two short vibrations followed by a longer one.  _Clarus_. Apparently he too is suffering a sleepless night. He's so grateful for the distraction that he snatches his cell out of his pants pocket at once.

 

Clarus  
  
**Today** 2:30 AM  
Regis. How is he?

 

He can only manage to send a few words back: empty, useless words.

 

Clarus  
  
**Today** 2:31 AM  
Unchanged. Other than bleeding through his newest bandages.

 

His Shield's reply is swift and uncannily similar to his own:

 

Clarus  
  
**Today** 2:32 AM  
Damn.

 

Then, even more quickly:

 

Go to bed, Highness. You've done all you can. Either he'll wake in the morning, or he won't.

 

Regis huffs out a laugh. Of _course_ the man would shift targets to his prince if he couldn't fuss over their young tag-along.

Knowing he's not entirely alone in being awake soothes some of his restlessness, yet still he grips the polished black banister hard enough to bruise the paint the moment he's made Clarus a useless promise and slid the cell back into his pocket.

_Gods._

Cor's weak hisses of breath beat at his conscience.

_It was I who made him my personal guard. Did he go to Taelpar because of me? Did I make him think he needed to prove himself?_

The idea torments him. Cor is young, so young, but he's proud, more so than Cid or Clarus or Weskham ever was. And he's fiercely independent. While they were abroad, he'd taken off on his own twice as much as his prince did, but with half as many wild, raging beasts and enemy soldiers nipping at his heels upon his return. And yet—his excursions were never so secret, nor so dangerous as to send him back with a great bloody slash on his chest, innumerable cuts on his arms and legs, and nothing but ancient-sounding gibberish to say.

 _Shield of the Chosen... trial... katana... arm... Gilgamesh_.

Regis pounds the balustrade, squeezing his eyes shut.

"Careful now, that stone and marble cost  _many_ thousands of crowns."

_What—_

His eyes fly open almost immediately and he jerks his head to the left. Just a few inches away, Ardyn sits casually on said black marble without a care in the world.

"Relax your fingers, won't you? Yes, there's a good lad. You'll need those intact for the Ring of the Lucii!"

Regis exhales, trying to calm his racing heart. "...I thought you were with Father at Cape Caem."

"Well... I  _was_." Ardyn shrugs, and makes a pretend finger-snap and warping motion as if to say,  _And now I'm here_.

 _I don't know what I expected_ , the prince thinks, stepping away from the balcony. Anyone else living in the Citadel would have entered his room through the front doors and showed him the proper deference before reporting on the status of the Lucian soldiers at the warfront, regardless of the late hour. Yet despite his imposing demeanor in court and his fearsome skill on the battlefield, no one who knew Regis' ancestor well would slip and call him  _deferential_.

Or overly serious.

"Oh, wipe that frown off your face, Highness! If you're still concerned about the wider territories near Caem, put it from your mind. You and your men fought valiantly enough that public perception of fair Insomnia remains positive. As for Niflheim's new  _toys_... they are nothing Mors and I can't handle."

Regis is looking into his bedroom; he's too distracted checking on his unexpected 'bedmate' to notice the way Ardyn's voice turns sibilant around the word  _toys_ and black shadows form briefly under his eyes.

"The possible agreement with Accordo is still lost," he replies distantly.

"Oh yes,  _that's_ toast. For now at least. But His Majesty is unconcerned with the setback, and I can't help but agree. Perhaps when the bulk of the fighting has died down we can sneak someone disposable into Altissia to re-establish communication with the Lady Claustra."

Something about the word  _disposable_ sets Regis on edge, and it is a struggle to keep his voice steady. "No one in Lucis is a worthy sacrifice in this war."

"You only say so because you haven't yet been touched by the horrors of war." Ardyn waves off the younger man's protests. "No. Don't defy me, little prince. Fighting in a score of battles on the continent is commendable, sailing across the sea for lands unknown is brave, but you have still not yet known true  _despair_. You are a boy who has never seen true  _horror_ : men's guts spilling from their bellies with the right twist of a knife; women losing limbs to well-aimed bullets so they cannot flee with their children; friends coming home with stumps for legs, or missing ears, or outwardly whole but with pitch-black souls already lost to the Beyond. Compared to that and more? One spy sent into the breach is  _nothing_."

The words hang threateningly in the air. Dared to respond and start a real conflict, Regis grits his teeth but demurs. He wants to protest—to say he's seen more than enough to have nothing but disgust for the art of war—but he knows better. Accordo was Regis' first long-term excursion. The first true test of the skills he has honed at home—and _he_ has the benefit of friends and bodyguards ever at his side. His father, too, dwelled close enough on the Lucian continent to be at his heir's side in a matter of hours had the need arisen. There are things Ardyn has seen  _alone_ in over a millennia of life and battle that would no doubt haunt a man who could actually sleep and wake rested.

Cor chooses that moment to hiss out another breath—and the noise catches the archduke's attention.

"Who is that?" He sniffs the air, and his expression darkens. "...And why does your room stink of blood, Regis? Are you injured?"

The prince waves his uncle off. "I am fine. The one injured is... is one of my personal guard. He's come back from Taelpar half-dead."

He hopes the mention of death (or something close to it) will make Ardyn lose interest. Instead it does the opposite; Ardyn swings his hanging legs around, gets to his feet with minimal staggering, and sweeps into Regis' bedroom the moment the latter finishes pronouncing the name of the crag. In the limited light, his eyes darken from bright ochre to mustard. When he leans over Cor's twitching, bleeding form, his black cloak spreads itself wide, like the wings of a carrion bird.

"Cor Leonis? The whelp who shot his mouth off about duty and cowardice back when Mors caught the pox and had to decrease the boundary Wall for a month?"

 _Of course he would remember that, and not Cor's astounding record of service._ _Or the fact that Cor insulted me too, after the Accordo debacle._

"Yes."

Ardyn scowls. "What the hell was he doing in Gilgamesh's lands?"

"He has not been conscious and lucid long enough to—" Regis cuts himself off, striding inside too to stare at the older man. "Hold a moment. Cor mentioned that name in his delirium. Who or what is 'Gilgamesh'?"

"Never you mind," the Accursed snaps. Regis is taken aback slightly at the new ice in his voice. "Answer me truthfully: did you send him there?"

 _"No!"_   Regis jerks his head sharply from side to side. "Cor is a fine young man, a worthy warrior. You know that sending a man to a meaningless death is not what I do. None of us were pleased to see him turn up tonight needing every curative in Weskham's old storage!"

Looking at Cor still makes him cringe. The boy's chest and abdomen are a mess of gashes, cuts from a sword so potent the wounds still bleed heavily through the palace's best bandages; Regis had had to hold Cor's guts in as Clarus plied him with elixir after elixir, keeping his finer magic in reserve for the inevitable re-growing and re-sewing of Cor's skin. Blue-black bruises ring Cor's wrists, where he still pulls futilely at the ropes keeping him in bed—a twisted mockery of a kinder, more sensual scene. His face is mostly unmarred, but is so pale that he looks ghostly in the light of the moon. The cuts on Cor's legs have mostly faded thanks to the prince's quick spellwork; along with thunder magic, light magic has blessedly always been his forte. It also kept his young guard from bleeding out more than once as they moved him from the front steps to the infirmary, and then from those blood-soaked white sheets to the more comfortable, private sheets adorning Regis' own bed.

He is doing better than he was when he was found on the Citadel steps, but magic and medicine have done all they can for him tonight. It is a miracle that he survived this long. Only Cor's own spirit can save him now—and that may have taken a blow, for the katana he whispered weakly about, the weapon he keeps closer than his clothes, is nowhere to be found. No curative can mend a missing weapon.

_Wait._

_Curative._

His green eyes blow wide for a moment: abruptly, he remembers the old tales, the stories he heard at Ardyn's knee. Unwritten accounts of how the Accursed was once a healer—no, the  _only_ healer of men cursed with Starscourge. The  _finest_ healer in proto-Lucis, better than any curative.

"Uncle Ardyn—" he begins.

"No," Ardyn says immediately. He cups Cor's cheek briefly in one large hand, and presses the teenager back into the pillows once he's looked his fill (and presumably, found no traces of the Scourge in his injuries). "Kill the thought."

"Cor is in stasis. Clarus and I have done everything we can for him—Cid and Weskham are too far away to help us before tomorrow or next week. With the severity of his wounds, even with all we've done, he may not have that much time. You are the strongest healer in Lucis—"

" _Was_ ," the eldest Lucis Caelum contradicts him fiercely. "I  _was_. Hundreds and hundreds of years before your time. Long before Bahamut gave a lesser version of my gift to the Oracles. The Scourge has long since poisoned the white magic which once sang in my blood—any healing I would do now would be parlor tricks before children. It would not be real; it would not  _work_."

Regis persists, desperately. "How do you know it wouldn't work?"

Ardyn stares at him, stares and lets the Scourge bleed briefly into his face, darkening his veins and leaching the color from his hair. "I know because I have tried."

Left unsaid is,  _you are not the first to ask me to heal someone you love_.

"Uncle Ardyn, please." Regis steps to the other side of the bed, grasping one of Cor's hands and squeezing it gently. "I do not ask you this to hurt you, or because I wish to see a miracle which defies the gods. Cor has fought valiantly in the war, and supported both myself and my father without becoming an unquestioning pawn. I did not send him to Taelpar, but if he went there must be a reason behind it. I—I want him to explain that reason to me someday, preferably on this side of the Astral plane."

Ardyn sneers.

"Do you think this is about my pride?" he taunts. Regis flinches, but he carries on. "My ages-long shame in having my birthright robbed from me and given to  _your_ ancestor? My occasional desire to spit in the faces of your gods? Hardly. If I could, I would wave my hand and send this boy skipping out of here. No, nephew, I said what I meant. It would not work. I  _cannot_  restore him."

Regis sinks into the chair beside his bed. Buries his face in his hands.

_Cor..._

There's nothing for it. His comrade will have to survive the night unaided, just as he feared.

Ardyn walks around the bed, and Regis feels a hand come down gently on his shoulder, rubbing in circles. He doesn't open his eyes to confirm what his senses are telling him: his uncle has seen past his anguish to the fear he takes care to show no one, and is doing what he can to soothe that fear. There is no magic in the gesture, but it makes him feel a hair warmer than he did before.

"Take heart, Regis. I can feel your magic running under his skin—better work than I've seen in decades. Not quite at my level, or at an Oracle's, but good in light of your training. You've done a fine job in giving Cor a fighting chance. The only thing you should do for him now is rest."

" _Rest?_   What if he gets worse during the night?"

"Then there is nothing more _you_ can offer him," Ardyn says bluntly. "He won't heal any faster with you drilling holes in him with your eyes."

Something makes his eyes flash, though, and he fishes in one of his overlarge pockets with his free hand. It's only after several seconds of mumbling indecipherable curses that he finally retrieves a slim black cell phone and rapidly dials his most frequent ten digits.

Regis is still caught up on the rare praise he was offered for his burgeoning magical prowess, and so he almost leaps out of his seat when the phone stops ringing and a familiar brisk voice emits from the speaker.

_"Yes?"_

"Mors, my majestic nephew!" Ardyn amps up his effusive demeanor all the more, if such a thing is possible. "Good to know you're still kicking out by that stuffy lighthouse. I  _did_ worry about leaving you alone."

" _My productivity skyrocketed the moment your car was out of view,_ " His Majesty King Mors, the Warhammer of Lucis himself, contradicts. His brows even  _sound_ like they're furrowing over the miles-long connection. _"I assume you made it safely back to Insomnia. What then is the reason for your call?"_

"Oh, mere curiosity. How quickly can you get one of your best field medics back to the Citadel?"

Regis startles. From the pause on the other end of the line, it sounds like his father does too.

 _"If you meet the lady at Longwythe and spirit her back the rest of the way? By shortly after midday, perhaps._ " The King's voice lowers, and something indecipherable sharpens each following word. _"Speak plainly, Ardyn—why do you have need of this?"_

The archduke makes a dismissive noise. "A disappointing leap of logic for you, Majesty. Of course the healer is not for me—and before you ask, she is not for your son either. Rather, the life of your stripling former bodyguard is what needs securing."

_"The Leonis boy?"_

"Yes, the prodigy." Ardyn examines his cuticles idly, keeping his lord sovereign on speaker like a casual deliveryman. He must notice how excited the prince is becoming, how high he is hoisting his youngest nephew's hopes for Cor's swifter recovery after so coldly dismissing them, but he doesn't even glance away from the shivering, bleeding wreck on the bed as he explains the situation in his own way. "The outspoken child seems to have finally bit off a bit more than he could chew during a trip to Taelpar Crag. He may yet survive to see tomorrow night, but Regis would prefer certainty."

Mors doesn't speak for at least a minute. Silently, Regis curses Ardyn for even mentioning that it was he who wished for Cor to be healed as soon as possible. His father is a hard man—hard to speak with, harder to impress. He values physical strength on the battlefield and emotional stiffness in the face of any other adversity. As a boy Regis was encouraged to find (a few) confidants and hold them close, but not to be mawkish about it. Certainly it did not cross Mors' mind that his son might find friends in his minders, or lovers in his childhood playmates.

_But enough of those thoughts._

Although he could speak up and claim his interest in Cor's well-being as simply the desire to see a highly valuable soldier return to the war, the King would probably see right through it. And even if the phone prevented him from doing so, Ardyn would just lay all Regis' personal feelings bare for all to hear. The old bastard _loved_ making his relatives uncomfortable with unspoken truths.

 _Best to get ahead of him_ , he thinks, opening his mouth to announce himself and his intentions. But his father speaks again and beats him to it.

_"I remember him. Leonis is young, but he is extremely skilled—and a loss we cannot afford. I'll send Aurelia back to Insomnia at once."_

A thrill of excitement and relief runs through Regis. Ardyn claps his hands triumphantly, then waves at his nephew as if to say  _there, you see? All fixed. And there you were getting all upset_.

"Excellent news, Mors. I'll meet the girl at the diner."

 _"See that you do."_   The king coughs over the line. It sounds like someone has nudged him.  _"Where is Regis?"_

"Living up to the city's name in your absence—what else? He's right at my elbow."

_Damn it._

Mors exhales so loudly that it rivals thunder.  _"...Regis Lucis Caelum, please explain to me why you are awake at nearly three in the morning."_

Ten years ago that tone would make him cower and seek excuses. Now, with the memory of war in his mind and Cor's gruesome injuries fresh under his eyes, coupled with the sleep he's been losing these past three weeks, it only makes him resolute, bordering on defiant. "I'm keeping watch over Cor Leonis, Father."

_"Hmmph. It's admirable of you to check on your subordinates, but there's nothing much you can do for them in the middle of the night. Your duty is to be ever ready for your people. That includes rest."_

"But Father—I've survived on less sleep, and still done my duty."

_"Perhaps. But your health must be your utmost priority even before the day you succeed me and don the Ring. Ardyn can look after Leonis. Go to bed at once."_

The last few words have a stronger bite—though they concern Regis' royal responsibilities, they come more from the father than the King. He's forced to back down in the face of the implicit threat. "...Very well, Father. I wish you a good night."

_"And you, my son. —Ardyn, I would speak further with you about Niflheim. Preferably now."_

"No rest for the wicked!" Ardyn cries. Making his nephew a bow, he sweeps toward the bedroom door he had previously spurned, and is through it in a blink. He doesn't go far—Regis can just barely hear him saying something about trade deals and missing shipments. He doesn't listen very hard, though, because his patient recaptures his attention.

"Re...gis."

"Cor," he whispers, leaning over the firecracker of a man the instant he hears him half-stir. He rocks back a moment later, disappointed—Cor was only calling for him in his sleep—but with a bit more hope. And not only because Cor finally feels close enough to him to call him  _Regis_ instead of his typical biting  _Highness_. If Cor is aware enough to dream, he might be well enough to face Aurelia's superior medical treatment tomorrow. Later today. Whichever.

"Sleep well. We'll have you fighting fit in no time."

Cor winces, but settles down.

Regis runs a hand through his dark hair and sighs.  _I should heed Father's word and sleep. ...And find another place to sleep._

As he rises to obey, there's a knock on the door. He frowns—Ardyn wouldn't knock, and even together they'd hardly made any noise to rouse others. Only his Shield should know that he's still awake. Clarus takes his duties seriously, but surely he wouldn't be so bold as to check on them at this late hour...?

"Enter."

The door swings open gradually and—

 _Well_. That's definitely Ardyn's hand on the door, guiding it wide, but he is still talking somberly on the phone. No, the person who enters is not his uncle.

"Your Highness. I just met His Grace outside, and he mentioned that you were also having trouble sleeping tonight..."

Regis' jaw drops.

"A-Aulea."

A vision has entered his room and curtsied. Though it's ridiculously late at night, Aulea wears a sweeping leisure dress of powder blue under her peignoir, with lace lining befitting her family's high status. Her long black hair is swept up in a bun, so he can see every inch of her pale neck as she looks up to meet his eyes. What excites him most, though, is the fluffy chocobo slippers she skips in with—they were a gift for her from him several years ago, and he feels a jolt of pleasure every time he sees the worn yellow fabric on her dainty feet.

"Couerl got your tongue, Regis?" She grins, and in doing so resembles more than one of the electric cats he glimpsed in the wilds of Duscae.

"Why aren't you asleep?" he demands.

"I just told you, I've been having trouble with it. The war has me—concerned. What about you, why are you still up?"

Regis hesitates at first, then realizes she has perfectly working eyes and ears, and admits: "...Cor has returned from his journey injured."

Aulea pales, and presses one hand to her mouth as she spots Cor's miserable state. "Oh, no... Will he be all right?"

"Father and Uncle Ardyn believe so. I... can only have hope."

"Well, then. I thought you'd like some company, and it looks like I'm not wrong."

Aulea doesn't give him the chance to protest, or cite the late hour, or even his own relative state of undress; she just steps over to him and puts a hand on his shoulder. She looks at him so kindly that Regis doesn't have the heart (or the strength) to send her back to bed. Only Aulea would wake in the middle of the night and be more concerned about her friend's peace of mind than her own. In order to make it to his door she must have dodged all the Crownsguard on his floor and hers. If she'd come a half hour sooner and beat Ardyn, he has no doubt that _she'd_ offer to keep vigil over Cor with him, and damn whatever luncheons or council meetings they might have to attend in the morning.

Such gentleness and dedication are just a few of the reasons why Regis plans to ask for her hand on her next birthday, once he's asked Mors and her parents for their approval. And yet—his father is the reason why he cannot take Aulea up on her offer now.

"I would love to look after Cor with you at my side, but I promised my father I would go to bed."

He expects her to pout—she does this thing, this expression with her lip and her eyebrows which he's folded to since childhood—but instead, her smile just gets wider and she moves her hand from his shoulder to hold _his_ hand. Her blue eyes twinkle like tiny stars.

"You won't hear me going against His Majesty," she says, drawing out the word  _hear_ in a way that makes his brows rise. "But I'm sure even he knows that you can't just close your eyes and drift off. Sometimes you need a little help."

"What kind of 'help' are you suggesting, Aulea...?"

Aulea pauses to go fishing in the pockets of her peignoir. Two seconds later, she holds two blue packets aloft that have a familiar logo.

"Why, only the best kind, my prince! How about you escort me to the kitchens and we make some hot chocolate?"

Several things happen at the same time. Inches from them, Cor's breathing eases and he slips into a deeper, dreamless sleep. Ardyn's chattering slips even further into the distant background. Miles away, Mors continues his political coordination with no regard to the hour.

And Regis, for his part, smiles for the first time tonight.

"That sounds wonderful."

**Author's Note:**

> ('How did Ardyn manage to sort-of help Noctis with his leg 22 years after this scene if he couldn't help Cor here?' you ask. 'Why, it's simple author hand-waving,' I reply. 'Noct's injury still has traces of the Scourge Ardyn can slowly extract with little harm to himself, while Cor just went and 1v1'd an angry old bodyguard who was Scourge-free. But hey, at least Cor gained Ardyn's respect. And also two days of his laughter when people started calling Cor "The Immortal".')
> 
> As you may have deduced by now, the titles of each of these works are based off popular turns of phrase and proverbs (hence " _a watched pot never boils_ " and other hat-picked sayings). They'll work until they... uh, don't.
> 
> thank you for reading!


End file.
